Boeing continues to work with NASA on much-delayed first crewed spaceflight

Interestingly, Boeing was awarded a $4.2 billion contract by NASA for the program, while SpaceX was awarded a far lesser $2.6 billion. Despite the massive aerospace company’s failure in launching a crewed Starliner mission so far, NASA is still hoping for Boeing’s Starliner to start working. Because until then, NASA is solely reliant on the Elon Musk-led SpaceX to launch its missions to the International Space Station.

But it is not like Starliner has remained on the ground all that while. It completed two uncrewed flight tests, including Orbital Flight Test-2, during which it docked to the space station on May 21, 2022. It was docked to the space station for four days before it reentered Earth and landed at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.

The crewed launch that was supposed to happen in July this year was delayed because Boeing found problems with Starliner’s capsule system and found that pieces of tape inside the craft was flammable.

NASA says that a set of parachutes is on track to be delivered and installed on the spacecraft by the end of the year. Also, Boeing has completed the removal of tape from the upper dome of the spacecraft’s crew compartment and work is underway to remove or remediate the tape in the lower dome.